Dec 5 The Courage to Become the Mother I Always Wanted to be

I’ve spent the last 10 years making a living off the internet by starting and selling blogs. In total, I’ve sold 4 blogs and earned hundreds of thousands of dollars throughout the years as a result. I’ve blogged about celebrities, coupons, mason jar recipes, subscription boxes and many other topics…basically..I’m an equal opportunity blogger! I blog about what I love and I blog about what makes me money.

Writing this piece has really allowed me to see just how far I have come in my professional life and in my personal life.

I suppose my story begins at 4:00am on a typical work day in 2009. My two children are sleeping across the room from mine. My husband is in bed next to me and the weather outside is frosty. My alarm clock sounds, I check Twitter and Facebook by the light of my phone. I get up, get dressed, grab a cup of coffee and drive 30 minutes to the train station to catch the 5:45 am train into Boston to go to my start-up job. I was the Social Media Strategist for an up and coming mobile app and I loved it.

I’d bounce off the train at 8:15am (yes that’s almost 3 hours one way) and get back on the train at 5:45 to arrive home at 8:15pm. Several nights a week I didn’t even make it home before 10:00pm because I would attend networking events to further my career and my place in my field. On the nights I did make it home, my children would be in bed already and my husband would be watching TV. I’d sit down on the opposite sofa and open up my computer and continue to work until midnight.

If I’m being honest, at the time, I didn’t see anything wrong with that lifestyle. I didn’t see anything wrong with working so much. As a matter of fact it made me feel important and needed. My mother worked a lot when I was a child, carrying at least 2 jobs at a time. It’s all I ever knew.

It wasn’t until my marriage dissolved that I realized the toll that my career driven lifestyle had taken on my life. All of a sudden I was a 32 year old divorced single mom who had missed the last several years of her children’s life in exchange for an impressive resume. But a resume wasn’t going to piece my family back together.

Truth be told…I never felt ‘good’ at motherhood. I never was the mushy gushy kind of mom that all of my friends were. I didn’t yearn to be home with my children. That didn’t come naturally to me. What did come naturally was being an employee. Being a star employee who got raises and praise. I was the type of person who needed that type of encouragement. And as most moms know…you don’t get that encouragement when you are staying home. You get screaming children. Messy living rooms and mountains of laundry. It’s hard and work was my escape.

Shortly after my divorce, I left my job in Boston. Commuting 3 hours each way just wasn’t an option anymore. It wasn’t good for my new family dynamic. And so instead, I started a small consulting business and worked with clients until I started a blog, which as luck would have it, allowed me to make a full time salary while staying home. For the first time in my life, I was able to drop my kids off at school, and be there when they got off the bus. Take time out of my day to attend school plays and pick them up from school when they were sick. I got to make up for all those times when I couldn’t do those things.

Finding love again...

The courage to become the mother I always wanted to be meant redefining my definition of success. I no longer needed a boss to tell me I was great.

I no longer needed a high paying salary to tell me I was worth it.

Now my definition of success is being able to live life on my terms and give my children my most valuable asset, time.

Our family of 5!

More from Chrystie!!!

Throughout the years, I’ve learned some helpful tips on how to get your blog noticed, how to choose the right topic and how to drive massive traffic to your website. I started Living for Naptime to share my best tips and experiences with other moms who might want to jump into having their own blog. There’s nothing I love more than when one of my friends asks me to help them set up a blog! My answer is always YES…and WHY did you wait so long?